


To Hermione Granger, A Drop of Honey, From Salazar Slytherin

by generalzero



Series: Help Will Always Be Given [7]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ficlet, Hogwarts Fourth Year, Humor, everybody has a bit of all the houses in them, inspired by the bullshit sword of gryffindor out of sorting hat business, look yall Hermione is smart and brave but she's also a stone cold bitch, obsessive sorting culture is divisive my dudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-13 16:48:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29031939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/generalzero/pseuds/generalzero
Summary: Salazar watches Hermione plot to kidnap Rita Skeeter, and approves heartily.(or)The four Founders of Hogwarts were by no means the greatest or most powerful wixen ever known, but on Hogwarts grounds and over Hogwarts students, their influence was sacrosanct. Whether through the magic of the Sorting Hat and the castle itself, or some other cunning and mysterious means of reaching through time, help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it.
Series: Help Will Always Be Given [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/979713
Comments: 4
Kudos: 42





	To Hermione Granger, A Drop of Honey, From Salazar Slytherin

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by:
> 
> 1) my frustration with obsessive sorting culture in fandom  
> 2) Rowlings generally lazy exploitation of the sorting mechanic in canon  
> 3) the thing where only a true gryffindor can pull godric's sword out of the sorting hat i lowkey detest this

Salazar loves women. Not physically--he rarely finds women appealing in the physical sense. No, Salazar loves women because all of them are nearly as cunning as he is. It is a trait learned through necessity, Salazar knows. The world being how it is, women must be clever and competent to survive, where men need merely be aggressive. Thus, in a sense, all women are Slytherins. Rowena and Helga laugh at Salazar when he voices this theory, but they have yet to present him with a single example of a powerful woman who wasn’t also devastatingly cunning.

So although Hermione Granger is a muggleborn and therefore not a candidate for Slytherin House, Salazar nevertheless is fiercely fond of her, especially when she does marvelous things like hatching a scheme to kidnap and blackmail an influential Daily Prophet reporter. Of course, Salazar is fond of Rita Skeeter as well, but he likes Granger slightly more. Salazar does occasionally find Gryffindor nerve to be admirable (though he will never admit it to anyone), and Granger’s schemes are always fantastically bold.

Granger’s delicious plot is nearly complete. She already knows that Skeeter achieves her impossible eavesdropping by transforming into a buzzing insect, but she is struggling to come up with a way to trap said insect in an innocuous manner. So the next time Granger reaches across the breakfast table for jam as she’s fixing toast, furrowed brows signaling she is deep in thought about the Skeeter problem, Salazar causes the honey jar next to her to topple as if she knocked it with her arm.

Granger pauses halfway through wiping the honey drops off the table, and Salazar savors the predatory glint that overtakes her expression.

“Honey,” she says. “You catch a fly with honey.”


End file.
